LOTTE REINIGER - REVIEW

---

LOTTE REINIGER

---

The first-ever full-length animated film was made not by Walt Disney, but by a German artist-animator Lotte Reiniger, who received an international fame by making silhouette films.

Lotte Reiniger was born in Berlin on June 2, 1899, in a privileged family. Even as a child she was interested in art. At the age of six Lotte started making her first silhouette figures. She quickly mastered the technique of Chinese silhouette art. She also was making silhouette figures for school theatre performances, such as "Romeo and Juliet".

As a teenager, Lotte Reiniger was interested in cinematography. From 1916 to 1917 Reiniger attended acting school, where she produced a series of silhouettes of actors, including Paul Wegener, famous German actor writer and film director. It was he who introduced Lotte to film industry.

In December 1919 she made her first own silhouette film "The Ornament of the Enamoured Heart ". Her husband Karl Koch, who she met up with in "Institute for Cultural Research", was director almost of all her films. It took them 3 long years to make famous "The Adventures of Prince Achmed".

"The Adventures of Prince Achmed"

In 1930-1932 Reiniger made three short silhouette films "10 minutes with Mozart", "Harlequin" and "Sissi". Among the dozens of cartoons created at the time, there is "Papageno" (1935). This short film is based on the opera "Magic Flute" by Mozart. "I'm obsessed with ballet, cinema, theater and Mozart" - confessed Lotte Reiniger.

When Nazis gained power over the country, Lotte Reiniger and her husband Karl Koch lived in London and Rome. After the death of Karl Koch in 1963, she stopped filming. But it still wasn’t the end of her career. Till very old age she traveled across the world with lectures. The last year of her life the artist spent in Tübingen, where she was buried. Lotte Reiniger  heritage is currently available in Stadtmuseum Tübingen(Museum).